100+ Funny British Place Names

April 26, 2013 update from Steph: Updated this page to add links to as many of the towns and streets as I could find in google maps. I originally added this list to my site on September 26, 2005, but I never verified whether the names were real places or not, until someone asked in comments. As far as I can tell, none of the thousand other sites that have this same list did either. It turned out that most of the names are of streets, rather than towns, so I updated the title of the page. If you have any names to add this list, feel free to contact me.

Percy Passage, London – This one was hard to track down – you basically have to use Google Street View because Google Maps doesn’t note this as an actually street. Do look around, because this is a cool little place. It’s a street that goes through buildings and then winds around in alleys. Londonist put together a helpful map of all of London’s Back Passages.

Scratchy Bottom, Dorset – This exists, all though it’s hard to find on maps. The link is to the wikipedia page. The location is a valley between Durdle Door and Swyre Head in Dorset, England. Also “Durdle Door”? Wow.

Swallow Passage, London – like Percy’s passage, Swallow Passage is an alley that passes under buildings, and isn’t marked by name on Google Maps. You have to use street view to find it.

There. Aren’t you happy that I’ve taken a survey of all the Cocks, Tits, Snatches, Mounds, Swells and Scratchy Bottoms in the United Kingdom so you don’t have to? List inspired by and contributed to from Rude Britain.

Other funny or unusual British towns and place names

While I was hunting down the above place names, I discovered others that were funny or interesting.